Westbam, We’ll Never Stop Living This Way (Mute)

Mute was bound to hit a dud after releasing so many ace records in a row, and Westbam is it. Germans are much better at experimentalism than they are at techno as evidenced by this pile of utter tripe. Westbam is the German equivalent of a hippie as the founder of The Love Parade, a festival that draws almost a quarter of a million people, and his brand of unmitigated techno has made him a superstar in his homeland, which isn’t so surprising since all Germans love techno.

Westbam has been djing since the mid-eighties and first hit the charts with “Monkey Say Monkey Do” in 1988. He has since been partially responsible for the colossal spread of house and techno throughout Europe. This record doesn’t exactly reinvent the genre much less do anything impressive or even remotely interesting. On some of the songs I seriously thought I was listening to an extended dance mix of George Michael’s “I Want Your Sex.” Yep, that bad. It’s techno. What can I say? It sucks.

Oh, and note to Mr. Westbam: never name a song “Wanna Get My Smurf On.”